Day 18--Chisos Basin Campground in Big Bend National Park

OK, words are beginning to fail me now that we are in Big Bend National Park. Amazing, awesome, magnificent; none of them are adequate. We are camping in the Chisos Mountains Basin at 5,300 feet, under the looming Casa Grande, a 7,325 foot volcanic peak. After paying (gulp) $3.06 for gas this morning we headed south from Marathon into the park. The campground is not recommended for trailers longer than 20 feet (which is what we are) because of steep grades and tight curves. But we got in without a problem and had a large choice of campsites. As expected there is no electricity, but there are flush toilets and cold running water in the rest rooms. We set up under the watchful gaze of 6 deer lounging two campsites away from us. The campground host assured us that food in a hard sided camper like ours would be safe from the bears and javelinas that are also visitors. We decided to take the 5 mile Window Trail, which begins at the campground. The first .25 mile was down steps which were put in by CCC workers. We could only imagine what coming back was going to be like! The rest of the trail was a more gradual descent of about 800 feet passing through an interesting mix of desert and mountain flora. The final .25 was a scramble over slippery rocks, lightly running creek bed and impressive rock steps. We clearly couldn’t have gotten in there without the steps. And then we were at the top of the Window pour-off, where the water drops 200 feet to the desert floor. Through the fissure canyon created one can see for miles across the desert to other mountains in the distance. The so called “Window” is a stunning view. As we got our pictures it began to drizzle and sleet a bit so we began the trip out. And what a climb it was! But the magnificent scenery all around made it worth it. After we recovered a bit at the camper we drove up to the lodge, which is about a mile up the hillside. We found out they have Wi-Fi and a restaurant up there, so we plan on celebrating an early Valentine’s Day on Saturday night with a meal out. We took the very easy .3 mile Window Sunset Trail for views of the sunset, which was becoming more interesting as the clouds began to clear. Later in the year the sun must go down right through the gap, but this time of year the spectacular vision is the color of the pinnacles surrounding us as the sun turned them bright red. Back at the camper we made dinner and ran the heater enough to keep it about 50° inside, as the temperatures slid down into the thirties.